As hard as it may be to take for France, many investors no longer have any doubt: Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni's Italy is now just as credible when it comes to public finances, if not more so.
"Once at the bottom of the class in the European Union in terms of budget discipline, Italy is now in a position to give lessons to France," said independent economist Philippe Crevel in an analysis published at the end of July. Some observers see Italy, now led by the far right, as a model of fiscal discipline for its neighbor.
The numbers most symbolic of the reversal are the interest rates that investors demand in exchange for holding the two countries' public debt. In 2011 and 2012, Italy was seen as so turbulent and unreliable that investors insisted on a premium of up to 400 basis points (4%) over French rates. When France paid 3% annual interest, Italy had to pay 7%. Since then, the risk premium has shrunk dramatically, dropping to less than five basis points for the main benchmark with a 10-year repayment period on August 15, a rate unprecedented since 2005. For five-year bonds, the gap between French and Italian debt on financial markets disappeared entirely in mid-July.
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